“The fact that I lost many friends here due to my stand on the transgender women vs drag queen issue, really shows how pathetic some transgender women had become when they cling on to their over-the-top cross-dressing gay friends as their salvation.

Instead of making heroes out of them, we must hold them responsible, and they themselves must learn to be accountable for consequences that impact transgender women whenever they visibly impersonate an extremist version of transgender women, that increases public bias and misunderstanding against transgender women, making womanhood all about clothes and turning transgender women’s lives into only gimmicks.

We do not condone slant-eye play. We are against blackface performances. We certainly should discourage drag queens.

After all, why does anyone need to drag for advocacy, let alone comedy? Think about it.”

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11 thoughts on “An Important Message For Transgender Women Who Support Drag Queens And Extreme Cross-dressers.”

I think the logic here is a bit flawed. Drag queens don’t impersonate trans* women – no, they impersonate women as showgirls – which is form of exaggerated theatrics, lip-sync/song, and dance. They themselves are a form of gender variant expression and fall under the trans* umbrella. There are even many trans* women, who have gone through HRT who also perform in a drag-style format – so I am not sure why you are trying to promote some kind of divide with your words here? I have found that when trans* women bash on the drag scene, it is because the public sometimes perceive drag performers and trans* women as the same thing, and not because the performers themselves have done anything against trans* women. So who is in the wrong? And who needs to grow, and be educated? The public? The trans* woman who looks like a drag performer? Typically, a trans* woman will only resemble the masc-femme blend of a drag queen if the trans* woman is early in her transition – or started it very late where certain masculine traits couldn’t be addressed, reversed, or softened out. Needless to say, the drag scene has done a lot for promoting the GLBTIQ community in a positive light, and to slam them is to do without a lot of strong, and powerful allies. And we need all the allies we can get, as trans* women. I am an active part of the community, I transitioned almost 11 years ago now, and have years of experience in advocating within the trans* movement – so please take my comment here as being from someone who has personal experience – maybe even similar to your own. Best wishes! https://www.facebook.com/Mead0wLea

Thanks for dropping by with your kind comments, mead0wlea. Perhaps my words are flawed, but not the logic. So please may I explain in kind.

– Never did I say drag queens impersonate women, rather, again, they are caricatures of women.

– Drag queens are performances, so much so even females can be drag queens, called bio-queens in general, let alone trans themselves.

– There is no divisiveness here. We must understand that drag is an exercise of art and expression, not a gender.

– With visibility, comes responsibility. We are at the defensive, therefore we must be the ones to grow to educate the public, not the other way round. There are too much pseudo-information given to the public, and we are responsible to counter it.

– Again, drag is an art, a performance. It has nothing to do with gender traits, and again it may bring a wrong message to the already heavy climate of intolerance. Drag queens will always be in the eyes of society, a symbol of enhanced choice, one which trans women should distance themselves from, and drag queens themselves do so to.

– The drag scene? Really, what has the drag scene really do, but to create even more myths and misunderstanding of who trans women really are? Men with dresses is a term we are trying to get rid off, and with the extremism of it?

– Allies are formed within ourselves, and with people who know us. I do not comprehend what you mean by “strong, and powerful allies”. The latter, if we could have, are straight people (who may or may not drag). Again, drag culture is a caricature of womanhood, which is why I posed the question; why does anyone need to drag for advocacy, let alone comedy?

– I myself have been an advocate for 8 years, very vocal, to see the consequences, to come to this conclusion. In fact, drag performances in my country are seen by many as an example of what the government wish to arrest; “men in dresses”. It is contrary to the work anyone wishes to do to advance transgender rights (which will open a new argument on conformity vs confronting).

I appreciate that we could come to terms to discuss about this. I know this is a sensitive topic. But I am happy that we could have a dialogue about the pros and cons of drag culture. :-)

And what gender binary are you talking about? There is no gender is drag. It is all shock clothes and over-the-top make up. You are either a woman, a man, both, or neither, and gender has nothing to do with drag, let alone its performances.

Interesting angle I have never thought of. The one thing that comes to mind is this: Are the American people smart enough to know the difference between drag queens and transgender individual? I mean it as a serious question… I’m curious about your thoughts.

Perhaps the apt question would be; are American people smart enough? I would still say we do not use individual intelligence as a marker of a country as a whole, likewise people should not see drag queens as representatives of transgender people. Do people know the difference? It will still depend on the individual, but if you were to analyse the climate in the States, especially in the light of the recent RuPaul derogatory term incident, even transgender people themselves do not wish to see the difference, let alone the general public. Hence, our need to educate everyone.

I may not feel comfortable with the public confusing drag queens for transgendered individuals – or thinking that they are typical of us, BUT, if *I* expect to be respected for being true to my self and express that, I don’t see how I can object to others doing the same.

Hi Helen. We are indeed being true to ourselves and express that, and deserve the respect for it. And thanks for getting a part of what I am trying to share on this topic.

But drag queens being the others doing the same? How exactly are they true themselves, spending a couple of hours with a flaming name and exaggerate every essence of the public image of women? How can enhanced caricatures ever be true?

What is true about drag queens? It is not a gender trait, everyone that drags already have their true gender, and most drag queens get the kick out of the attention. But in essence, their true selves are outside their drag fetishism. And most of them have no gender dysphoria, while we are the ones who are living our true genders regardless of what we wear everyday. Drags are the opposite; what they wear is a performance.

Again, it needs to be stressed that we do not hate drag people. But like it or not, they are ill representations of our experiences, in fact by reducing us to a performance, it trivializes what we go through in our lives, and there needs to be an understanding of how this can work against transgender rights, for the sake of their shock dress fetish.

I’m a transwoman who began transition in the Bible Belt South of the U.S. Yuki, I agree with your points. I will also further say, I do not hate drag. I just don’t support it and anytime someone asks me if I do drag, I educate them on the difference